


Extreme Nacho Flavor

by miraculousmultifan



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Arthur Is Exhausted, Crack, Episode: s01e08 The Beginning of the End, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, M/M, Time Travel Fix-It, it was 2am and i had the urge, the merthur is mostly implied
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-10
Updated: 2020-06-10
Packaged: 2021-03-03 19:14:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,832
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24650665
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/miraculousmultifan/pseuds/miraculousmultifan
Summary: Merlin loves Doritos. They could possibly be the best thing he has ever tasted. But would he give up Doritos to go back and save Arthur? That’s a good question… Why can’t he just have both?orMerlin gets sent back in time to save Arthur. He’s older and wiser this time, so it’s pretty easy, but recreating Doritos in medieval times might be more than he can handle.
Relationships: Merlin/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Comments: 11
Kudos: 130
Collections: Oh_god_oh_no





	Extreme Nacho Flavor

**Author's Note:**

> this is HEAVILY inspired by that tweet from forever ago that says "We take it for granted today, but a single Dorito has more extreme nacho flavor than a peasant in the 1400s would get in his whole lifetime." Merlin is the only thing on my mind these days, so I decided to run with it. Merlin will bring peace and Doritos to Albion.

As much as Merlin missed his princely prat, Doritos almost made the wait worth it.

Of course, each day of waiting was torture and all Merlin wanted was to see his King again… But the modern world had extreme nacho cheese flavor, so would it really be that bad? Merlin thought back to the rat stew he had made for Arthur and the oatmeal Gaius tried to make him eat his first morning in Camelot and shuddered. Yeah, extreme nacho cheese was worth every bit of the wait.

Obviously, destiny would choose this moment to make Merlin fix things since it was clear that Arthur didn’t feel like leaving his cozy lake.

“Merlin, you need to wake up! You wouldn’t want to make the prince angry on your first day as his manservant.” Gaius was knocking on the door to Merlin’s old chambers in the physician’s tower.

Merlin sighed. At least he was dressed the part. If he had shown up in his modern clothes he probably would have been executed on the spot. With as much enthusiasm as Merlin could muster without his Doritos, he went about his morning duties and brought Arthur his breakfast.

Naturally, Arthur was still in bed, as a lazy prat such as himself is wont to do. Merlin couldn’t bring himself to wake him up just yet. After over a thousand years, could you blame him? To see him so young and peaceful made Merlin almost tear up. Almost. He wouldn’t cry just from seeing his King’s face; that’s absurd!

“Up and at ‘em, lazy daisy! You’ve got a big day ahead. Plenty of hitting people with swords to fulfill your brutish needs.” Merlin went about pulling Arthur out of bed and readying him for the day.

“Hmmm… Maybe I was wrong about you, Merlin. Despite your insolence, you do seem to be a better servant than I anticipated. Why, you even remembered to bring the breakfast before you woke me up!” Arthur stretched before sitting down to eat, missing Merlin’s panicked face.

“Right well, if that’s all, sire, I’ll be off. Have a good day or whatever…” Merlin said, already on his way out the door.

“I spoke too soon,” Arthur mumbled to himself, still staring at the door in disbelief.

Merlin went about the rest of his chores for Gaius (and the occasional chore for Arthur) absentmindedly. He supposed he would have to fix things if he didn’t want Arthur to die in this timeline too. And the Doritos… He had to do something about the lack of Doritos. He began to make a plan, assuming everything would go the same way it went the first time.

Saving Arthur was a lot easier when Merlin knew everything that would happen. The fact that he could control his magic more with his _years_ of experience probably also helped. Soon though, he was forced to make an actual decision. It wasn’t enough to go about everything the same way since it obviously didn’t work out too well in the end.

The druid boy. Merlin wouldn’t consider himself a heartless person, but that wasn’t to say he hadn’t been seriously considering murdering Mordred where he stood. Eventually, he couldn’t bring himself to do it. Mordred, despite being a little rat with a horrible destiny, was still only a boy. Merlin couldn’t kill a boy; it wouldn’t be right. So he decided to at least change something.

He brought Mordred to Arthur’s chambers. He didn’t know why he did it, but he didn’t want to bring him to Morgana. At least Arthur hadn’t drawn his sword.

“Hi, Arthur!” Merlin smiled, holding Mordred in front of him by the shoulders.

Arthur sighed, walking over to sit on the edge of his bed. “Merlin. Why is there a boy in my room?” He watched as Mordred seemed to shake even more from Arthur’s words.

“I can explain that, but first, the poor boy is so tired. Look at him, he’s shaking! I’ll just lay him down in the antechamber. Then we can talk. Maybe over some wine?” Merlin looked over his shoulder as he led Mordred to the antechamber and sent Arthur an overexaggerated wink. He turned around to avoid hitting a door with Mordred’s face (don’t want to hurt the poor door) and put him into bed.

Arthur turned pink and busied himself with flattening out the sheets on his bed. Then there was a knock on the door.

“My lord,” the guard said as Arthur opened the door. “We are searching for the druid boy that escaped from the town. Have you seen anything?” Arthur cast a quick glance to the side to see Merlin standing in front of the antechamber door with a sheepish smile.

“No, I’m sorry. I haven’t. Now, if you don’t mind, I was in the middle of a meal. Good luck with the boy!” Arthur shut the door quite forcefully before turning to Merlin.

“You know I think I will need a little more wine for this conversation.”

Merlin grinned at him and sat down at the table, reaching over to grab a couple pieces of cheese from Arthur’s plate. “So, I was walking around town looking for ingredients-”

“Wait, ingredients for what? You’re not apprenticing for the cook.” Arthur sat next to him, snatching back his plate and fixing Merlin with an incredulous look.

“You know, that’s probably a good idea. I’m sure she’ll be able to help. Anyway, we’ll get to that later. As I was saying before I was rudely interrupted, I was looking for ingredients in the town when the druid boy shouted for me to help him in my head.”

“So you imagined it… You kidnapped this random boy?”

“No, no. He’s a druid. They can speak to me in my mind, you see.” By this point, Merlin wasn’t all that worried about dying. What could be worse than living without Doritos for a few months? Oh, and living without Arthur for a thousand years, but that wasn’t important. “Anyway, he asked me to help him, so here we are! Do I get any of that wine, by the way?”

Arthur sighed, having gotten used to Merlin’s general everything by now. “Here’s a goblet; help yourself.” Arthur picked up his own goblet and drained it in one gulp. “So, if I’m listening right, you are harboring a wanted druid boy, and your first thought was to bring him here? To my chambers?”

Merlin grinned at him, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “Yeah, you got it! His dad is in the dungeons right now, so I guess we have to help them escape. Shouldn’t be too hard, though.”

“Right…” Arthur wasn’t sure when Merlin had gotten so comfortable around him, but it confused him to no end. “I’ll just go do that now, shall I? Then we can talk about that other thing, I suppose.” Arthur got up and stretched his arms above his head. “Take the boy to the outskirts of the town, yeah? I’m sure you can find some way to conceal yourselves.”

“Of course. See you in a jiffy!” Merlin beamed, walking into the antechamber while Arthur headed for the dungeons.

Needless to say, the boy’s father was very surprised. “Prince Arthur? Why are you helping me to escape?”

Arthur sighed shaking his head. “I have no idea how this happened. I think I must be absolutely besotted.”

Merlin met Arthur just outside the gates.

“Where’s the druid boy?” Arthur asked, becoming increasingly exasperated with Merlin.

“Oh, yeah. He’s right here.” Merlin’s eyes glowed gold for a moment before Mordred appeared right beside him.

“I guess we’re just adding that to the list of things we need to talk about…” Arthur mumbled, running his fingers through his hair before turning to the druid boy and his father. “Well, off you go then. Happy travels.” Arthur grabbed Merlin’s arm and led him back to his chambers, Merlin following easily, chatting about something unimportant.

“I can’t wait to tell you about my plan. I think once you try it, you’ll love it.”

Whatever it was, Arthur didn’t think anything could faze him anymore. Once they got back to Arthur’s chamber’s Arthur held up a hand to stop Merlin from speaking and drained an entire bottle of wine, albeit watered-down.

“Okay. You may now speak.”

“Right, so I’ve been trying to recreate Doritos for like, the past month, but there is nothing cheesy enough to capture that extreme nacho flavor. It’s been driving me crazy! I think it‘ll take some time, but I bet if we work together, we could do it.” Merlin was sitting at the edge of his seat, excitedly waving his hands around.

Arthur tried to stop himself from letting out yet another sigh. “Of course, Merlin. I was actually referring to the magic.”

“Oh, yes. The magic. So, I’m apparently the most powerful warlock to walk the earth and it is my destiny to protect you, the Once and Future King of Albion. And so that’s what I’ve been doing. I’ve kind of already done this before, though, so I suppose it’s easier the second time around. I admit, I must not have done a great job the first time seeing as I’ve had to do it all over again and all.” Merlin swallowed the mouthful of food he was speaking around before taking his own goblet and filling it with ale with a small gesture.

“Ahuh, ahuh. Right. Of course. So what exactly happened the first time?” Arthur was leaning back in his chair with his eyes closed, massaging his temples with the tips of his fingers.

“Well, you died. That much should have been obvious. I waited for you to come back for like a thousand years, but I guess you couldn’t be bothered because I got sent back in time to fix everything. And now I can’t eat any more Doritos. So really this is your fault.”

Arthur raised his eyebrows in a mix between shock and general uncomprehension. “You’re not even a little bit worried that I’ll have you executed for sorcery?”

Merlin shrugged and shoved another piece of bread into his mouth. “Not really. We did just help two magic users escape execution. Plus, it’s not like I can really die. I’m both extremely magic and immortal apparently, so I doubt it would work.”

Arthur stared blankly at Merlin, trying (and failing) to process the information at such a late hour. “You know what? I think I’m going to bed. I’ll see you in the morning, I suppose.” Arthur trudged to his bed, shrugging out of his clothes and flopping onto the sheets. Despite all that had happened that day, Arthur was starting to get used to the nonsense that Merlin had brought with him to Camelot. He furrowed his eyebrows, contemplating everything Merlin had dropped on him that day before finally sighing in defeat. “Goodnight, Merlin,” he mumbled into the sheets before promptly passing out.


End file.
